PRIVACY CONCERNS: The new ID cards would increase government monitoring of civilians, intrude on privacy and could endanger national security, rights groups said
Taipei Times
Date: Sep 11, 2019
By: Jason Pan / Staff reporter
The Taiwan Association for Human Rights (TAHR) and the Judicial Reform Foundation (JRF)
Taiwan Association for Human Rights secretary-general Chiu E-ling, center, and social activists hold a news conference at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei yesterday to urge the Control Yuan to investigate a government plan to issue electronic ID cards.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
The Ministry of the Interior had pushed the eID scheme without any legal basis or assessing its impact on personal privacy, and keeping the public in the dark about the NT$3.3 billion (US$105.7 million) tender for the project, association secretary-general Chiu E-ling (邱伊翎) said.
The eID would become a tool for the government to track all aspects of people’s daily lives, spurring tighter control and pervasive monitoring of society, and undermining national security if eID data are hacked or leaked, Chiu said.
The ministry expects to start issuing the new ID, which has an embedded electronic chip for storing digital personal information, in October next year. [FULL STORY]
